General Wilson's despatch, detailing Mr. Davis's.capture, shows that he really
attempted to escape in his wife's dress to the swamp, and was betrayed by his boots, which were not the boots of ladies. Of course this incident has given rise to numerous caricatures in New York, one of which, representing the ex-President with a revolver in his hand, a white bonnet flying off his head, and very conspicuous boots beneath the crinoline, we have seen. Beneath are written Mrs. Davis's terrible warning to the Union soldiers who captured her husband, "Take care of the President, or he may hurt you." There was no harm in his running away in woman's clothes, except on the theory of a recent well-known essayist, difficult to take to heart, that dignity is a personal duty of a high order. Indeed it may possibly save his life, for when the North have had a good laugh at their defeated foe, and seen his crinoline at the bazaar to which it is said to be promised, they will feel much less inclined to hang him. As yet the only impor- tant item of evidence connecting the Richmond Government with Mr. Lincoln's assassination, is the asserted discovery in the Con- federate Secretary's (Mr. Benjamin's) office at Richmond of the machine key to the cypher found in Wilkes Booth's trunk at Washington. There is also evidence,—if the letter be genuine,— that Mr. Davis had sanctioned the conspiracy to set on fire the Northern cities ; for an endorsement, said to be in his own hand- writing, on the letter directs the Secretary of State to consider the efficiency of the plan. Mr. Davis is, it is said, to be tried at Baltimore by a civil tribunal, presided over by Chief Justice Chase.
